Good news from MacWorld San Francisco today! Apple began it's transition to Intel chips with the release of a new iMac model and a new laptop called the "MacBook Pro". I'm rather envious of the MacBook Pro: it features a dual-core Intel processor at 1.67 or 1.83 GHz, digital/optical audio in and out, a 256 MB graphics card on the high-end model with dual-link built in, 15.4-inch LCD, remote control for controlling music and DVD playback, a magnetic power adapter (so tripping over a power cable will detach the cable, rather than yanking the computer), a built-in digital video camera (for videoconferencing), and a bunch of other sweet stuff. It's about 4x as fast as the PowerBook G4. And it's about an inch thick and weighs only 5.6 pounds!

The iMac line got a bunch of improvements, too. The new iMac features the Intel Core Duo chip like the MacBook Pro. I'm not positive what the other features are, since I'm not as interested in the iMac, but it is reputed to be much faster than the previous iMacs.

Very excited about this. Can't wait to see more intel based macs.

Macbook is defiantly looking like my next purchase. Ilife 06 looks nice too, wish alot of the new stuff didn't require .Mac, but yea...

Love the new intel-mac commercial as well... boring little tasks.. hah.

looks pretty nice. i, of course, still fail to see what's special about macs.

Hmm, maybe I can try to convince my parents to buy me one of those for college next year, preferable the MacBook...

Oh, the hardware's nice, but the secret lies in the operating system.

wow...the first intel based comps are out already! didn't think i'd be that fast though
i've been waiting to buy one!

alright, then what's so nice about the OS?

I can only list why I like it, but there are several good reasons:

1. The GUI. I find it to be a lot better and much more comfortable than that of other operating systems. I like that the menu bar stays at the top of the screen, instead of traveling with the window (the menu bar thus effectively has infinite depth and is very easy to click). I like how applications generally stay open until you tell them to quit, instead of quitting when the window is closed. I like how the Dock only shows an icon for each application, rather than a tab for each open window (as is common in Windows, KDE, GNOME, and most other windowing systems). I like the wide range of keyboard shortcuts, which are easier to use and remember than in Windows. I like how the notification area isn't cluttered with useless icons (as is common in Windows). I also really like how applications have a consistent look and feel, something not always found in Windows. Plus, the interface is beautiful, yet functional.

2. Bundles. I like how applications don't need to be installed—they can just be dragged from one place to another, or onto another disk, or uninstalled by putting them in the trash. All the necessary files are contained within the application bundle itself, which just appears to be a single file. A lot of files are like that, too, which makes copying files simple.

3. Special characters. I can type characters in other languages with simple keyboard modifiers, rather than having to remember 4-digit numerical codes. And everything's based on Unicode, so reading characters in other languages does not require the installation of special software.

4. Rich development environment. Objective-C and Cocoa is one of the nicest languages and API's I have used—and the development tools on OS X are free.

5. Stable. OS X rarely crashes. Apps that crash rarely take down the entire system.

6. Viruses. No need to worry about those. No need to worry about spyware, adware, or any other malicious software, either. It's good to take some precautions, but protecting a system doesn't require the constant care that Windows does.

7. User friendly. Apps are easy to install, uninstall, and move. System maintenance is simple. Many powerful tools have a GUI and a command-line equivalent. Maintenance and setup is not as difficult as in other systems—most things work right out of the box.

8. Built for the 21st century. OS X was designed mostly from scratch for the 21st century. Unlike Unix variants or Windows, it doesn't have legacy technologies, code, or interface elements from the 1980s or before—it was built to take modern computing into account.

9. Hardware just works. I don't have to worry about drivers, ACPI support, graphics cards not working—everything just works. Of course, the trade-off is that the specific hardware can be somewhat limiting in terms of processors, motherboards, even graphics cards, but I don't mind paying the price for a system that's functional, one that I don't have to play around with to make it work.

10. Drag and drop functionality. I can drag a URL to the desktop, and have it turn into a file that opens up a webpage when double-clicked—no need to save a bookmark, and I can file it anywhere. I can drag text easily from one app to another, or save it as a clipping on the desktop. Images can be dragged from an application to the desktop, or into other apps.

Those are a few reasons that come to mind. I'm not saying it's perfect, of course—it has some things I don't like about it—but OS X is an excellent combination of ease of use and raw power and functionality. I think most people, if they used it a bit, would come to at least admire it, if not switch to it. I've met a lot of Windows fanatics who hated the old Mac OS, but quickly came to live OS X once they used it a bit. But I'm not concerned about people switching—those are just ten of my own personal reasons why I think it's a nice OS.

what's the approximated price?

$1999 for the low-end MacBook Pro, $2499 for the high-end. I don't know about the iMac, but you can check on prices at store.apple.com.

Wow.. Computers are getting more and more pricier these days.. :/

But I'll definitely admit -- I'm a Windows lover and I LOATHED all other Mac OS's, but when I came across MAC OS X, ... WOW. I love it! I still don't know how to do everything on it, but hey, I'll admit that it's easy to learn once you get the hang of it. :] The concept --not to mention bouncy icons!--is great. I like how it changes. I mean, people went wild when windows XP was developed, but I'd say it isn't so much different from windows 2000, except on how the start menu looks and a few minor adjustments. I like that mac os x looks A LOT different than before. And as for the shortcut buttons, there's a button to make all the program windows move away.. f12? F7? I forget.. but I think it's neat--All the programs slid away to the side. It's convenient. I know that Windows has the little "Show Desktop" button on the taskbar, but I like how I can press a button instead of having to drag the mouse and clicking the show desktop button. haha :P

Although I'd have to say, speed-wise, sometimes it takes a little longer to open up something than it does on Windows. But I'm just basing this on my experience--it might be different for others.

As for viruses... Personally, I deem that since presently, many people use PCs, those who create viruses target them at PC users. I mean, how many apple-mac users do you know? I sure don't know a lot. I'm just saying that around where i live and the people I know, most of them have PCs. There's very few that target apple computers, which is a plus.

As for safari.. The only downside is that some things cannot be viewed on it, whereas on internet explorer it can be viewed... Bleh...

Once I get 2k, I'll definitely get this bad baby.

They are a bit pricey, but when you take into account the software that you get with a Mac—photo management software, a productivity suite similar to MS Office, a developer suite, apps like GarageBand and iCal, a decent mail client, built-in PDF rendering software, and other such apps—the price really evens out as compared to PC's.

yea. The slightly higher price of macs is defiantly justified by the MASSIVE amount of pre-installed software that comes with every machine.

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,3973,1136018,00.asp

Notes on Apple benchmarking.

wow, that's nuts. 2500 and there are still accessories...

An interesting article, but it doesn't apply to this case; the benchmarks cited are in comparison to the old iMac and PowerBook, not to any non-Apple PC's. Also, the article is several years old, which also diminishes its relevance in this case.

I wanted a new iMac with Intel processors in it ever since Apple announced to change to Intel processors last year (yeah.. we are in 2006 -0-)
I was planning to buy it some time in March or April so that the prices would drop just a little while the technology is still there lol.

Oh it's relevant. A few years ago, they were trying to get the benchmarking software to run slower on intel processors. Now they're probably trying to optimize it for Intel processors!

Oh it's relevant. A few years ago, they were trying to get the benchmarking software to run slower on intel processors. Now they're probably trying to optimize it for Intel processors!

The article is irrelevant because it's entirely different scenarios. The ability to "play" with optimization here is not as great. Furthermore, the benchmarks aren't to show that these Macs are better than a competitor's offerings; they're to show that the machines are an improvement over previous models. It's not likely Apple would "fake" benchmarks in this case—and even with clever optimization techniques, the new models are not going to show an improvement of 400-500%. So yes, I think the article is irrelevant. It's a shame Apple even released benchmarks—the PowerMac G5 is fast, especially the quad-core model, but everyone just brings up the benchmarks and the controversy, which was largely fueled by people angry that Apple finally had a fast machine.

At any rate, benchmarks are often useless anyway—rarely do they show a computer performing under a "normal" load, and it's very easy for anyone to optimize benchmarks. Apple's were so easy to criticize because the way the benchmarks were performed was publicized. Furthermore, some of the "tweaks" were an attempt to compare two different architectures that are really an "Apples-to-oranges" comparison (if you'll pardon the pun). Also, as noted by The Register, many vendors don't release the methods used to get their own benchmarks, so it's hard to compare benchmarks.

Also, the point can be made that raw performance is not the only factor in a computer. I, for instance, am not terribly concerned about raw performance. Most of my computing tasks involve browing the Internet, reading email, writing basic software, and writing papers—tasks for which I value usability, stability, and security over raw performance figures.

Oh Mac OS, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways..

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I swore I would never buy another PC again, but I did.. I would love to have that machine though, it's beautiful. I get to work on my boss's computer a lot though, he's got an old school iMac with OS 10, and while the machine wasn't built for the operating system and can get quite slow, I still love using it.

Time named the new iMac its Gadget of the Week, and PC Magazine gave it four and a half out of five stars.